Contents

An emissions trajectory designed to limit warming to around 1.5°C, with no or limited overshoot, by rapidly reducing greenhouse-gas emissions and reaching net zero carbon dioxide globally.

24/7 carbon-free energy is an approach that seeks to match electricity consumption with carbon-free electricity supply on an hourly or similarly granular basis.

The 30x30 target is a global conservation ambition to conserve or protect at least 30 percent of land and sea areas by 2030.

4C is a sustainability certification system for the coffee sector based on a common code and verification approach.

The Aarhus Convention is an international agreement on access to environmental information, public participation in environmental decision-making and access to justice.

Abiotic depletion is an impact category concerned with the use or depletion of non-living natural resources such as minerals, metals or fossil resources.

An absolute target is a goal expressed as a total amount of change, regardless of changes in production, revenue or activity levels.

Access and benefit sharing refers to arrangements for accessing genetic resources or associated knowledge and sharing benefits arising from their use.

The timely and affordable ability to choose and obtain quality, appropriate production resources and services needed for a farming system.

The capability to reach and participate in markets on informed, reliable and fair terms, with realistic choice over buyers, products and conditions of exchange.

Accessibility is the design of environments, products, services, information or workplaces so people with disabilities and diverse needs can use them.

A relationship in which an actor must explain and justify decisions or performance to others who can question the account and trigger correction, consequence or remedy.

Accountability to affected populations is the practice of ensuring people affected by decisions or programmes can receive information, give feedback and influence outcomes.

A third-party attestation that a conformity-assessment body is competent to perform specified assessment tasks within a defined scope.

An accreditation body is an organisation that assesses and recognises the competence of conformity assessment bodies against specified standards.

Acidification potential is an impact category estimating the contribution of emissions to acidifying effects on soils, water bodies or ecosystems.

Active ownership is the use of investor rights and influence, including engagement and voting, to affect company behaviour or stewardship outcomes.

Adaptation finance is funding directed toward reducing vulnerability and increasing resilience to actual or expected climate impacts.

Additionality is the test of whether an emissions reduction or removal would not have occurred without the carbon finance, intervention or incentive being claimed.

The extent to which an intervention causes an outcome beyond what would reasonably have occurred under the applicable baseline, law, common practice or existing incentives.

Additionality in energy describes whether a purchase, project or intervention causes renewable or low-carbon energy generation beyond what would otherwise have occurred.

An adequate wage is pay assessed as sufficient under the applicable legal, collective-bargaining or normative framework, which may not be identical to a living wage.

Adverse impacts are negative effects on people, the environment, rights, communities or systems connected to an organisation, product, activity or relationship.

Affected communities are groups of people whose rights, wellbeing, livelihoods, environment or cultural heritage may be changed by an organisation's operations or value chain.

Afforestation is the establishment of forest on land that has not recently been forested, subject to the definition and time period used by the relevant framework.

Afforestation, reforestation and revegetation are land-based activities that establish or restore vegetation cover and may generate climate claims when measured against defined rules.

Agenda 2030 is the United Nations sustainable development agenda that includes the Sustainable Development Goals and related commitments.

Aggregation and disaggregation concern when information is combined for reporting and when it is separated to preserve material differences.

An aggregator is an actor that combines products, materials or data from multiple sources before sale, processing or onward transfer.

A land-management system in which woody perennials are deliberately integrated with crops or livestock so the components interact ecologically and economically over space or time.

AI governance is the set of policies, roles, controls and review processes used to manage the responsible use of artificial intelligence systems.

Aid effectiveness is the assessment of how well development assistance achieves intended results while respecting ownership, alignment, coordination and accountability principles.

An air quality index is a public communication scale that translates measured air pollution levels into categories of health or exposure concern.

An algal bloom is a rapid increase in algae in a water body, often linked to nutrient enrichment and sometimes associated with reduced water quality or harmful toxins.

Algorithmic bias is a systematic distortion in automated outputs that can arise from data, design choices, assumptions or deployment context.

The deliberate process of making strategies, requirements, incentives, data or actions consistent enough to support a shared objective without necessarily making them identical.

The Alliance for Water Stewardship is a standard-setting and membership organisation focused on responsible water use and catchment-level water stewardship.

Allocation is the partitioning of inputs, outputs or impacts among co-products, functions or systems in an assessment.

The level, scale or pace of improvement an organisation seeks to achieve relative to a sustainability challenge, benchmark or pathway.

amfori BSCI is a supply-chain social compliance programme focused on improving working conditions through a common code of conduct and monitoring approach.

Anaerobic digestion is a biological process in which microorganisms break down organic material without oxygen, producing biogas and digestate.

Annual matching is the matching of electricity consumption and energy attributes over a year, even when timing and location may differ.

Anomaly detection is the identification of data points, events or patterns that differ materially from expected behaviour or normal ranges.

The transformation of data so that no individual is identifiable by means reasonably likely to be used, taking the data, available auxiliary information and context into account.

Anti-bribery and corruption refers to policies, controls and practices intended to prevent, detect and respond to bribery, corruption and improper advantage.

An anti-greenwashing rule is a regulatory or supervisory requirement intended to prevent misleading sustainability claims in financial products, services or communications.

Anti-money laundering is the set of controls used to prevent, detect and report attempts to disguise the proceeds of crime as legitimate funds.

Anticipated financial effects are expected changes to financial position, performance or cash flows arising from sustainability-related risks and opportunities.

API integration is the connection of systems through application programming interfaces so data or functions can be exchanged in a controlled way.

ASC is a certification programme for farmed seafood and aquaculture supply-chain claims.

Aquifer depletion is the reduction of groundwater stored in an aquifer when extraction exceeds recharge over time.

Article 6 of the Paris Agreement is the part of the agreement that provides for cooperative approaches, including international transfer of mitigation outcomes and mechanisms.

An Article 8 fund is a financial product category under SFDR associated with promoting environmental or social characteristics, subject to the framework's disclosure rules.

An Article 9 fund is a financial product category under SFDR associated with having sustainable investment as an objective, subject to the framework's disclosure rules.

An independent engagement designed to increase intended users' confidence in defined sustainability information by evaluating it against suitable criteria and reporting a conclusion.

Assurance mapping is the process of identifying what assurance, review or control activity covers which risks, processes, data or disclosures.

An assurance opinion is the conclusion expressed by an assurance provider after assessing subject matter against criteria.

The condition in which sustainability information, processes and controls are sufficiently defined, documented, evidenced and governed to support an independent assurance engagement without major...

Assurance-ready data is information prepared with enough structure, evidence, controls and traceability to support independent review.

A causal judgement that an observed change was produced by an intervention, rather than by other influences or what would have occurred without it.

Attributional LCA is a life cycle assessment approach that describes the environmental impacts associated with a product system under defined average or existing conditions.

A systematic, independent and documented process for obtaining objective evidence and evaluating it against defined criteria to determine the extent to which requirements are fulfilled.

Audit evidence is information used by an auditor or reviewer to support conclusions about whether a claim, control or disclosure is reliable.

Audit fatigue is the burden and reduced effectiveness that can arise when suppliers face repeated, overlapping or poorly coordinated assessments.

An audit trail is a documented record showing how information was created, changed, reviewed and approved, so that reported data can be traced back to evidence.

Automated decision-making is the use of software or algorithms to make or materially influence decisions without full manual determination.

Avoided emissions are estimated emissions reductions outside an organisation’s own inventory that occur because a product, service or intervention displaces a higher-emitting alternative.

B Corp certification is a private certification for companies assessed against governance, worker, community, environmental and customer criteria.

The background system is the set of upstream or supporting processes in an assessment that are usually modelled using databases or secondary data.

A balanced scorecard is a management tool that tracks performance across multiple dimensions rather than a single financial or operational measure.

The Basel Convention is an international treaty addressing the control of transboundary movements of hazardous wastes and their disposal.

A documented reference condition, value or scenario against which change is assessed, defined for a specific indicator, population, boundary and point or period in time.

A baseline scenario is the reference case against which emissions reductions, removals, impacts or changes are estimated.

The reference year against which emissions performance, reductions or target progress are measured.

Baseload is the minimum level of electricity demand or supply that is present over a sustained period.

Basis risk is the risk that a hedge and the underlying physical exposure do not move in the same way.

A battery energy storage system is a system that stores electrical energy in batteries and releases it when needed.

A defined reference point or comparative standard used to interpret performance, set expectations or assess whether a result is stronger, weaker or different from an appropriate comparator.

Benchmarking is the comparison of performance, practice or position against peers, standards, historical results or other reference points.

Benchmarking schemes is the comparison of standards, labels or certification systems against selected criteria, requirements or performance expectations.

Beneficial ownership identifies the natural persons who ultimately own, control or benefit from a legal entity or arrangement.

A beneficiary is a person, group or organisation intended to receive benefit from a programme, policy, project or intervention.

Best available techniques are the most effective and advanced practicable methods for preventing or reducing emissions and environmental impacts in a regulated context.

Best-in-class is an investment approach that favours issuers or companies with stronger sustainability performance relative to peers in the same sector or category.

Better Cotton is a sustainability programme for cotton production focused on farming practices, livelihoods and continuous improvement.

Voluntary action that goes further than the minimum legal or mandatory requirement applicable to an organisation.

Beyond value chain mitigation is climate action or finance outside an organisation's own value chain, intended to support wider mitigation while not replacing internal emissions reductions.

A systematic tendency in how evidence is selected, measured, interpreted or used that pushes conclusions away from the reality they are intended to describe.

A bio-based material is made wholly or partly from biological resources rather than fossil-derived inputs.

Biochar is a carbon-rich material made by heating biomass in limited oxygen and used in some contexts as a carbon removal or soil amendment pathway.

Biochemical oxygen demand is a measure of the oxygen microorganisms need to break down organic matter in water.

Biodegradable means a material can be broken down by biological processes, but the claim is incomplete without conditions, timeframe and environment.

The variability of life within species, between species and across ecosystems, together with the relationships that allow living systems to function.

A biodiversity footprint is an estimate of the pressures or impacts that an organisation, product, activity or consumption pattern places on biodiversity.

Biodiversity net gain is a planning or project approach that aims to leave biodiversity measurably better than before, within a defined method and boundary.

A biodiversity offset is a measurable conservation action intended to compensate for residual biodiversity impacts after avoidance, minimisation and restoration steps.

Biofuel is fuel produced from biological material such as crops, residues, waste oils, wood or other biomass.

Biogenic carbon is carbon contained in or released from biological material such as plants, biomass or soil organic matter.

Bioplastic is a broad term for plastics that are bio-based, biodegradable, or both, depending on the specific material and claim.

Bird Friendly is a Smithsonian certification for shade-grown coffee intended to support habitat conditions for birds and biodiversity.

Blended finance is the use of public, philanthropic or concessional capital to mobilise additional private investment for development or sustainability outcomes.

Blockchain traceability is the use of a distributed ledger to record supply-chain events, transactions or attributes for later verification.

Blue Angel is a German ecolabel for products and services that meet specified environmental, health or consumer-protection criteria.

Blue carbon is carbon stored or sequestered in coastal and marine ecosystems such as mangroves, tidal marshes and seagrasses.

Blue hydrogen is hydrogen produced from fossil fuels with carbon capture and storage applied to some associated emissions.

Blue water is freshwater in rivers, lakes, reservoirs and aquifers that can be withdrawn or used directly.

A critical term for presenting an organisation as more socially responsible, ethical or aligned with recognised social principles than its underlying conduct and evidence justify.

Board independence is the degree to which board members can exercise objective judgment without undue influence from management, controlling shareholders or conflicts.

Board oversight is the board's monitoring and challenge of strategy, risk, controls, performance and accountability.

Generic, reusable reporting language that could apply to many organisations and therefore provides little entity-specific information about material sustainability circumstances, decisions or performance.

Bonded labour is work demanded as repayment for a debt or obligation where the worker's freedom to leave or repay is constrained.

Bonsucro is a certification platform for sustainability in sugarcane production and supply chains.

A chain-of-custody model in which verified attributes are represented by transferable instruments that move through an administrative system separately from the physical material flow and are retired to...

Bottom of the pyramid refers to lower-income populations considered in relation to markets, development needs or inclusive business models.

BREEAM is a building sustainability assessment and rating method used for buildings, infrastructure and communities.

The Brundtland definition describes sustainable development as development that meets present needs while considering the ability of future generations to meet theirs.

A buffer pool is a reserve of credits or units set aside to manage reversal, non-permanence or other integrity risks in a crediting system.

The obligation placed on the person making a claim, taking a decision or seeking an exception to provide evidence sufficient for that position to be accepted.

A business case is the rationale for an action or investment, including expected benefits, costs, risks and strategic relevance.

Business continuity is an organisation's ability to keep critical operations running or restore them after disruption.